4.27 AVERAGE

dark emotional mysterious slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Plot
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

swils519's review

4.5
challenging dark mysterious medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

Audio. 4.5
Excellent writing!

Went in blind and wasn’t expecting this storyline. Very captivating.

I really enjoyed this! The absolute scale of the narrative was stunning and I was intrigued by the mystery. I kept feeling bad for Saint every time she devoted EVERYTHING to Patch and he never seemed to appreciate it but their ending felt nice.

The reveal that Toomes was performing abortions and that's why he had blood in his basement was surprising. The fact that Nyx killed Callie's father (for raping her and leading to her fatal abortion) and then killed himself because Toomes was about to be executed (I assume that was Nyx's reasoning) was heartbreaking. They should've gotten their happy ending in the sun.

The discussions of abortion were interesting and I was feeling a little weird when it seemed like Saint was regretting hers. I had no reason to think Whitaker would take an uncomfortable pro-life stance but other authors blindside me with that so I was wary. The fact that Saint had actually put her son up for adoption was really surprising.

Grace being Eli Aaron's son was not the biggest shock but it was a good resolution.

I just really enjoyed the story and the characters (Sammy was a gem). It was a great literary mystery.

melboucher's review

4.0
challenging dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

It hurt me good.

Dark, then darker, then wait, a trapdoor to a trapdoor?

Really fantastic read.

Maybe I wasn't able to quickly pick up on what felt like multiple instances of time warping, and it felt jarring & left me feeling for context for WHEN I am.

Boom. A year.
Boom. Ten years.
Boom. I dunno

It's still a great novel.
dark emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
jdkelly's profile picture

jdkelly's review

3.0
mysterious sad slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes